But the new King James found, before he was twenty years old, that the Douglases themselves could act with equal cruelty and lawlessness.
The king was fond of a brave young soldier named Maclellan, who, having some quarrel with Earl Douglas, was thrown by him into a dungeon in his castle. So the king wrote a letter to Douglas, saying he must set Maclellan free, and sent this letter by Maclellan's uncle, Sir Patrick Gray. When Douglas saw Gray riding up to his castle, he at once guessed the errand. So he came out as though he were delighted to see him, and insisted on his sitting down and having dinner with him, before the king's letter was opened and discussed. But the treacherous earl had given secret orders that Maclellan should be beheaded while they were dining, so that after dinner was over, and the letter was read, he could say that this had been done before he had seen the king's message.
Gray dared not show his anger, for fear he too should be killed. He mounted his swift horse and rode away, but the moment he was outside the castle walls he shook his mailed fist at Douglas and cried out—
"Treacherous earl, disgrace to knighthood, some day you shall pay for this black, base deed!"
Douglas mounted his men, and they pursued Gray almost to the gates of Edinburgh; but he rode for his life, and faster than they.
When Douglas and the king next met there was a stormy scene. The earl was so proud and wilful that he would not bend to any of the king's wishes or heed the king's anger in the least. So King James, mad with rage, stabbed the reckless earl with his dagger, and Sir Patrick Gray, seeing this, struck him a death-blow with his axe.
The king was in Stirling Castle, a powerful fortress at the top of a steep hill, when the new earl, the younger brother of the murdered man, rode up with six hundred followers, and burnt and plundered the town before the king's very eyes, and added to the insult by publicly declaring that King James II. was a law-breaker.
For three years the quarrel went on between the king and the Douglases, but it was then evident that there could be no peace between them. So at last the king's army attacked the collected forces of the strong Douglas family at a place on the Borders then called Arkinholm, where the picturesque little town of Langholm now stands. Here the beautiful river Esk receives the water of two smaller streams, and so it was a good place to make a stand for a fight. The battle was long and desperate; three brothers of the bold black Douglases were there, and they withstood the king's men till the rivers ran red; but their cause was hopeless. One was slain in battle; one was taken and executed; one escaped into England; and the power of the Black Douglases was gone.
Thus it was that the strongest and most famous family of the Borders was broken up, because its proud leaders dared to dictate to the king himself.
Chapter XIII